


Prejudice and Stereotypes

by AFlameThatFlickersOutTooSoon



Category: The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton
Genre: Chapter lengths go from less than 100 to more than 700, I wrote these for school, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Prejudice, Probably doesn’t have to be rated teen but I’m paranoid, Stereotypes, also too lazy to change it, like really short, so short, these are short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-05-01 13:56:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14522082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AFlameThatFlickersOutTooSoon/pseuds/AFlameThatFlickersOutTooSoon
Summary: Pain is still pain, no matter how much you have. You shouldn’t devalidate your own struggles just because someone else has it worse. Something that Cherry told me when I first met her is that things are rough all over.- P.M.C.(Frick why am I so bad at summaries)A collection of really really short things that I wrote for school then decided to post on here.





	1. The Obituaries

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote these things for an assignment in school then decided to post them on here. 
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own The Outsiders.
> 
> (Cross-posted on quotev.)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some random person writes Johnny and Dally’s obituaries... it doesn’t go well.

On April 24th, at 7:18 PM, Johnny Cade died. Johnny died from a broken back and severe burns that he got rescuing several small children from a burning church in Windrixville. We will remember him as a hero. Johnny was too kind to be remembered as the delinquent that he was before he became a hero. When we think of Johnny, we should all know that he should not be defined by the people he chose to befriend, for he was too good to be associated with the hoods and JDs that he called his friends.

On April 24th, at 9:43 PM, Dallas Winston died. He was shot down by police in a parking lot after robbing a grocery store and pointing a gun at the police officers. Dallas Winston should serve as an example of someone who made all the wrong choices, and as the opposite of what every one of you should strive to be. His death should send a message to all of the people like him or who are straying down the same path as he did.


	2. Ponyboy and Cherry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ponyboy and Cherry talk and everything’s a mess.

Cherry: Hey, Ponyboy.

Ponyboy: Hey Cherry.

Cherry: I, uh, heard about Johnny. 

Ponyboy: You did?

Cherry: Yeah, there was something about it in the paper.

Ponyboy: Really?

Cherry: There was something about Dallas Winston, too. 

_(There is a moment of silence.)_

Cherry: I’m sorry. I know you were close to them.

Ponyboy: You don’t have to apologize. You didn’t kill them.

Cherry: I know… I just… Bob was my boyfriend.

Ponyboy: You’re not responsible for what he did.

Cherry: I know that, but sometimes it feels like I am. Maybe I should’ve stayed with them that night, instead of having them drop me off at my house. Maybe then that fight wouldn’t have escalated that much or maybe it wouldn’t have started at all.

Ponyboy: If that’s true, then maybe it’s my fault. I was the one Johnny was trying to save when he stabbed Bob.

Cherry: I guess it’s just survivor’s guilt.

_(They stand in silence again.)_

Cherry: Are you still mad at me?

Ponyboy: Why would I be mad at you?

Cherry: Our conversation before Johnny died. When I said that I wouldn’t go see him.

Ponyboy: No, I’m not mad. I think I understand… maybe. The only side of Bob I ever saw was the side that beat up kids for fun, so it was easy to not see him as an actual person. But you saw more of him than I did. I wouldn’t want to go see the person who killed Dally, even if they were a good person and all Dally had ever done was hurt them.

Cherry: Thanks for understanding.

_(Cherry smiles.)_

Ponyboy: I didn’t think anyone cared enough about greasers to put anything about their deaths in the paper.

Cherry: Well… they kind of bash greasers. Johnny’s basically says that he wasn’t a ‘real’ greaser because he saved those kids. And Dallas’s says that he was an example of what not to do and who not to be. And I feel kind of terrible because Bob’s only talked about how he was a good kid who got attacked and murdered. And I know that isn’t true. Yes, there was a good side to him, but there was also a bad side. The side that got drunk and as you put it, ‘beat up kids for fun.’ But they only talked about how he was good, just because he had money.

Ponyboy: Well there goes my hope that this place is starting to accept greasers a bit more.

Cherry: We’re making progress… kind of. Me and Randy are talking to you.

Ponyboy: That’s two people. 

Cherry: I was talking to a friend the other day, and they were talking about some issues that they had and how they’d like to talk about them to someone they didn’t know and I suggested that they write letters to you. I thought that it might be a good opportunity for them to talk to a greaser without knowing it and maybe see that you aren’t really that bad. Would you be okay with that?

Ponyboy: Yeah, I’d be fine with it. 

Cherry: There’s still the question of how to get greasers to talk to Socs. I mean, I can understand why they wouldn’t want to. You said yourself, I drive a Corvette while your brother drops out of school to get a job.

Ponyboy: And I can understand why Socs wouldn’t want to talk to greasers. Neither group is full of heroes, neither group is full of villains. It’s not the group they belong to, it’s the individual.


	3. Ponyboy’s Response

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ponyboy is pissed off.

Dear whoever wrote Johnny Cade and Dallas Winston’s obituaries, if they can even be called that,

Who do you think you are to judge Johnny and Dally’s characters without ever even meeting them? You say that Johnny doesn’t deserve to be associated with us, but guess what? Without us, Johnny never would’ve known love or affection! And you don’t get to say that he could’ve gotten that just as easily with ‘good’ people, because the people you see as ‘good’ people wouldn’t have given it to him, just because of where he grew up, the amount of money he had, and the amount of hair oil he used. Johnny didn’t suddenly turn good after he saved those kids, he was good the whole time. 

And Dally. You shouldn’t judge someone based on what you see on the outside. Your obituaries are hypocritical. Sure, Dally was always one of the greasers that walked the line between greaser and hood, but that doesn’t make him a bad person. Dally risked his life for Johnny when he pulled him out of that church, and he risked going to jail or went to jail to keep Johnny, me, and our friends out. And that gun wasn’t loaded. He didn’t point it at the police because he wanted to hurt them, he did it because the only thing he loved had died a few hours before. I’m not trying to claim that Dally was a saint. But he was a whole lot better than you made him out to be.

-Ponyboy Curtis


	4. A Collection of Letters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ponyboy talks to Cherry’s friend.

Hi. You’re probably wondering how I got your address. I was talking to Cherry the other day and I mentioned that I had some stuff that I had to take off my chest. She suggested that I start writing letters to you and that she’s drop the letters off at your place. I don’t know who you are, and I think maybe that’s what Cherry intended, for me to talk to someone without having to worry about being judged by someone I know or who knows me. I’m not sure if you’d be okay with that, so I guess that’s why I’m writing this. To ask if I can write to you. I’m not sure if it’s going to help at all, but Cherry seems to think it will.  
-L.M.T.

I’m fine with you writing to me, as long as you don’t try to figure out who I am. Maybe I’ll tell you someday, but that should be my decision. I get that the point is that you need to talk to someone you don’t know, but if you want to know just ask, and if I don’t want to tell you, don’t push and don’t take it personally. The same goes for me.   
-P.M.C.

Okay. Cool. Should I just start writing? Maybe. You might already know this, being Cherry’s friend, but her boyfriend got stabbed a bit ago. I wasn’t particularly close to Bob, but his death was a shock. I guess I just never expected for him to die. He wasn’t a particularly good person, but there was just something about him that made people follow him. And you never expect someone that young to die. He was only twenty when he was killed. And before it, it was easy to just ignore death. Easy to pretend that it wasn’t real. I had never really given death much thought before. But then he died and it hit me. The inevitability of death. And how it could happen at any moment. Sometimes knowing that makes me want to give up because why am I working so hard and stressing so much if I could be dead any second? Sometimes it makes me want to work twice as hard so that I can try to make a difference before I die. We go our whole lives planning for the future, usually without giving a second thought to whether or not the future will come.  
I don’t know what you’re thinking as you read this. I don’t know what your home life looks like. I’m not sure if our problems are similar or if mine pale in comparison. Maybe you can relate to this. Maybe you’re sitting there laughing about the kid who thinks a dead sort of not really friend is a heavy burden to bear.  
-L.M.T.

Pain is still pain, no matter how much you have. You shouldn’t devalidate your own struggles just because someone else has it worse. Something that Cherry told me when I first met her is that things are rough all over.  
-P.M.C.

Did you see that article in the paper about Johnny Cade and Dallas Winston’s obituaries? I think it was by one of their friends, Ponyboy maybe? I don’t know. It was something weird like that.  
-L.M.T.

Yeah, I saw it. It wasn’t my best work by far. I could’ve made it better, but I was angry, you know?  
-P.M.C.

Wait your best work? Are you Ponyboy? Are you a greaser?  
-L.M.T.

I wrote that it was mine, didn’t I? My brother always tells me that I don’t think about things before I do them. I guess this was one of those times. But yeah, I’m Ponyboy. And yeah, I’m a greaser.  
-Ponyboy Curtis

Wow, um, I guess I had never really thought about the possibility of you being a greaser. I knew that Cherry had friends who were greasers, but you were just so nice and smart and… that sounded really terrible, didn’t it?  
-L.M.T.

Yeah, it kind of did. But I don’t blame you. Before I met Cherry, I assumed that all Socs were terrible. But after talking to her for a while, I finally realized that some of you aren’t really that bad.  
-Ponyboy Curtis


	5. Public Disgrace or Asset to Society

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cherry and Ponyboy write something together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow this is short.

Greasers. Hoods. 

Socs. ‘Good’ kids.

The Socs can be a public disgrace one day and an asset to society the next. The greasers are always a public disgrace. 

These are the boxes we are pushed into because boxes are the easiest way to define us. These are the labels used to define us, and these are the labels that make it almost impossible for us to see how similar we truly are. We are all public disgraces, and we are all assets to society.

-Ponyboy Curtis and Cherry Valance


End file.
